Sunday Salon -- Grandkids edition

Weather: Sunny and warm. 

Buildzi: Yesterday we babysat our grandsons while their parents went up to Seattle to see the musical, Les Miserables. While his younger brother was napping, Ian, his Auntie, and I spent an hour having fun playing with Buildzi, a fabulous puzzle/engineering set of game blocks. It teaches all kinds of skills like balance, counter-balance, reading photo directions. After we competed for speed we started playing around with photographing each other through the holes in our construction. See collage above.

Goin' to the zoo, zoo, zoo. How about you, you, you? You can come too, too, too. We're goin' to the zoo! We took Jamie to the zoo on Tuesday and had a fabulous day experiencing the animals and sea life there. We started singing the Raffi song about "Going' to the Zoo" and Jamie picked right up on it and sang it throughout the day. The red wolf, bottom right, came over to the glass where Jamie and another little boy were standing. We teased them that the wolf was coming over to see if he could eat them. The other little boy said, "If he does eat us, we will come out as poop." KIDS! You can't make that stuff up. Actually it was a very poop-forward day. We witnessed the goat standing on a rock letting the poop fly, the elephant's pile was huge; the sea otters swam over to us, pooped, then swam away. We called it Otter Poop, not to be confused with an Otter Pop. Ha! If you've never heard of red wolves before, you need to know that they were once declared extinct in the wild, but recovery programs, like the one at the Point Defiance Zoo in Tacoma, have successfully bred many pups, some have been reintroduced to the wild. They are safe yet, but we are hopeful. (Red Wolves Conservation Efforts)

New trampoline: Our grandkids got a trampoline for Christmas from their other grandparents. The weather finally cleared and the boys are having a heap of fun on it. The video cracks me up because of Don's attempt to keep up with the boys. 

Never play a superhero game with a grandson if you don't know your superheros! Ha-ha. We were both duds at this guessing game. And when it was Ian's turn to guess we were duds at giving clues.

Biking: Our grandson Jamie is practicing with his strider bike.

All-Electric: Don got his all-electric pick-up truck on Friday. He reserved a spot to order the Ford F-150 Lightning over two years ago. It's been a long wait. Exciting days. One of our first rides was taking our grandsons to the YMCA to go swimming, after moving their car seats from my car.

Books:

• Currently reading:
• Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Zevin. It was a top Goodreads book last year. Let's see what all the fuss is about. 53%, audio.
• How to Be a (Young) Antiracist by Kendi. I've seen the adult version around for several years but I'm interested in this one directed at teens. 10%, print.
   
• Finished this week:
• Humans by Brandon Stanton. See my review here. Print.
  
• Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Kawaguchi. I looked forward to reading this time-travel novel but was pretty disappointed in it. Print.
  

 

-Anne